Francis Albert Sinatra was born December 12, 1915 in Hoboken, New Jersey. He died of a heart attack May 14, 1998. Why, you might ask, would a Sinatra-themed puzzle appear on June 8? Well, Frank's daughter Nancy was born June 8, 1940. She had several big hits in the 1960s, including Sugar Town, These Boots Are Made For Walkin' and a duet with her father, Somethin' Stupid, which spent four weeks at number one on the Billboard Hot 100 in April-May 1967.

Some clever clues today: "Take sides" for EAT, "Join the service, perhaps" for PRAY, "They're raised in schools" for HANDS, and "It may get you to look down" for ASTERISK

The theme of today's Los Angeles Times crossword by C.C. Burnikel is PTAMEETING ("After-school event"). Three horizontal answers and three vertical answers include the letters PTA. The answers intersect at the letter T --- "PTA meeting," get it?

ADOPTAROAD was clued with "Highway beautification program." The national program is known as "Adopt A Highway" but many small communities, which have no highways, have an "Adopt A Road" program. Individuals, businesses and organizations can pay for litter removal along a section of a freeway or highway and, in exchange, a sign is erected which shows the name of the person or business. Yes, the sign can be regarded as a small-scale advertisement but the sign is much nicer to look at than all the roadside litter. For information about the program, go to

"Triumphant shouts" is TADAS. "Ta-da!" first appeared in print in 1913. The Oxford English Dictionary says the exclamation is "imitative of the sound of the musical flourish or fanfare (composed of one short note followed by one long note) which often accompanies an entrance, trick, etc., in various kinds of performance."

I'm glad you're back. I enjoy reading your critiques and getting the extra information about the entries and clues. I was worried that maybe you had given up and started to feel guilty since it doesn't seem anyone ever thanks you for posting these. So thank you and welcome back!

Thank you for the "thank-you" -- but I never left. I don't comment on each day's puzzles, only the puzzles which have an unusually clever theme and/or include uncommon words and phrases. I started reading at age four and I used to read the dictionary at night. I not only learned thousands of big impressicve-sounding words, I learned all the Greek and Latin roots, prefixes and suffixes so when I saw an unfamiliar word in a book or newspaper, I could usually figure out what it meant without having to look it up in the dictionary. Ever since, I have been a philologist -- someone who studies languages and their histories. "Philology" comes from the Latin philologia, from Greek philologos, from philia ("love") + logos ("word, speech").

Now.....how can we get more crossword enthusiasts to participate here?